Sales Training That Works: Seven Ways to Boost Sales Performance Faster

“Selling is hard. Training shouldn’t make it harder.” That’s the Litmos mantra—because your training should empower, not overwhelm. Whether you’re onboarding new hires or revamping your team’s skills, it’s time to simplify and elevate your approach.

Selling is hard. Sales reps and sales managers have difficult jobs; it takes a special kind of person to be willing to go into a sales career, whether it be B2B or B2C selling. It’s even more special to be good at it. Sales reps need to be knowledgeable about the selling process, the customer’s buying preferences, their products, and their company’s systems and tools. This is all on top of basic selling skills, business acumen, and effective communication.

It’s no surprise that sales can be such a high-stress, high-turnover job: the turnover for sales representatives hovers around 33%, three times the turnover of all other jobs in the U.S. After the Great Resignation in 2021, turnover rates rose even more, ending up 58% higher than they were in 2020.

A lot is required of salespeople. They need extensive and continuous training to meet those expectations. Unfortunately, the number-one thing reps never have time for is – you guessed it – training. It’s not that salespeople don’t want to learn. In fact, good sales reps are constantly learning. But by enabling sales teams to learn through easier, more accessible, faster – and even enjoyable – training, companies can empower sales reps to sell more.

We’re Not Helping Salespeople Win

Some say selling has changed from “the old days,” but maybe it isn’t selling that’s changed. Rather, the processes and tools that sales reps use haven’t kept pace with customers’ access to information.

As a result, many organizations today still send new sales reps to a central location for a “boot camp” (i.e., onboarding) and expect the reps to be fully equipped from that point forward. Ideally, those sales reps receive periodic product or skills training after onboarding. Unfortunately, this type of sporadic training negatively impacts retention. What reps need is continuous learning and enablement.

Sales reps learn more when they have varied methods of training and a good balance of self-paced courses and in-person training. But most importantly, sales training is not one-size-fits-all. Your newbies have different needs than successful, tenured reps, who likely need different learning paths than middle-of-the-road reps who may be struggling.

Why Sales Training is Critical and Why Personalization Matters

Even with limitless access to information online, customers still expect sales reps to be more knowledgeable than they are. Customers demand prompt and quality response times and service. It’s well documented that personalized experiences impact customer loyalty, which directly affects the bottom line regardless of your industry. In fact, Customer Experience (CX) leaders show an annual growth rate of 17%, compared with a mere 3% for the CX laggards. Studies show that strong customer service pays dividends: 94% of customers say good customer service makes them more likely to make another purchase. According to Bain & Company, improving customer retention rates by just 5% can increase profits by 25 to 95%.

Businesses that lag in Customer Experience (CX), on the other hand, face mounting challenges. Unhappy customers are more likely to spread the word of a bad experience than a good one, and businesses providing bad CX are less likely to know it; that’s because only about 1 in 26 unhappy customers actually complain to the company. To make things more difficult, customers now expect more from vendors: 60% of service professionals say customer expectations increased over the last few years.

Five Signs It’s Time to Refresh Your Sales Training Strategy

The time investment and expense of onboarding, as well as the lack of engagement and alignment that can arise from poor training, are all factors that can prevent your company from meeting its sales goals.

We’ve outlined these common concerns below, but to explore each in more detail, we recommend downloading our recent eBook, Rev Up Revenue: Sales Training for Every Career Stage, which explores best practices for meeting the needs of your salespeople through continuous, strategic training.

These are five of the most common reasons to update sales training strategy, according to Litmos customers:

1. Your Sales Onboarding Takes Forever

Depending on what your company sells, it can take three to six months before your rep is productive. When was the last time your company revised your onboarding process? If it wasn’t in recent memory, it may be time to revisit.

2. Your Sales Reps Aren’t Hitting Quota

Ramped quotas are great for the sales rep’s attainment numbers during that time, but not so much for the manager or company trying to hit targets.

3. Your Sales Reps Are Job Hunting

Losing a sales rep can cost an average of $2 million in lost sales. The cost of hiring and training a sales rep is certainly part of that expense, but so is the cost of lost productivity as new reps go through the hiring and onboarding process. Making these processes easier by offering engaging, accurate, and accessible training could save your company’s bottom line in the long run…

4. Your Sales Training is Dated, Irrelevant, or Inaccessible

How often is your content updated? What are the different delivery methods for your sales trainings? If your training isn’t relevant and easily accessible by your salespeople, they may turn to external sources – less authoritative ones, or ones less aligned with your business principles – to get the information they need. Try providing sales reps with access to regularly updated, self-paced training on your products, and to general selling skills courses.

5. Your Sales Reps Aren’t Delivering Exceptional Customer Service

This is a head-scratcher, now that we’ve entered the Experience Economy era. Reps should not have to guess what the company’s CX promise is. They need to be trained to deliver it. The good news about cross-training your sales teams in CX is that everyone wins. Your customers have a great experience; reps make more money; and the company earns loyal advocates in both the customers and the employees.

Seven Steps to Improve Your Sales Training

If the list of common sales challenges above sound all-t0o-familiar, don’t be alarmed. You’re not alone. 72% of sales leaders say that their training isn’t effective, according to a recent survey conducted by The Sales Collective. The good news is that we know the reason why: those same sales leaders cited lack of personalization as the culprit for lackluster sales training.

So what steps can you take to get your sales training up to speed? Here are seven ways to transform your sales training strategy:

1. Speed Up Onboarding and Boost Productivity

Sales rep onboarding can drag on, but what about time-to-productivity? While it may take your sales reps up to 6 months to complete onboarding, how long does it take them to actually start closing? The truth can be discouraging, with some studies showing that salespeople need up to 15 months to become a top performers. For longer sales cycles, ramp time could be even longer.

Let’s shorten that ramp time. Here’s how:

• Use microlearning modules that repeat core concepts in digestible bursts.

• Empower reps with self-paced access to updated training, so they don’t rely on outdated or irrelevant sources.

Pro-Tip: Coach managers to assign just-in-time learning — pull key modules when onboarding new reps starts, not weeks later.

2. Reinforce Learning & Fight Forgetting

Your team retains only 30% of what they learn each week.

Let’s fight the forgetting curve. Here’s how:

• Build in quick refreshers post-training—via quizzes, easy-to-access AI course summaries, and mobile boost reminders.

• Connect your LMS to your CRM to align learning and performance metrics and more easily embed knowledge into the flow of work, so sales reps can get the training the need in the moment.

Applying training to time-sensitive problems and practicing skills after courses are complete makes training stick—and keeps reps sharp even after training ends.

3. Tailor Training to Real Needs

Each rep has different challenges: whether they need onboarding, sales strategy insights, or sharper soft skills.

How can we personalize sales training to drive results? Let’s find out:

• Diagnose learning gaps using performance data using learning analytics.

• Combine personalized coaching with self-guided learning — set up one-on-ones to discuss your sales rep’s goals, and encourage them to create a personalized training plan using AI tools.

Providing guidance can help reinforce fundamentals reps, while self-guided learning gives them the confidence to take charge of their own personal development. 

Pro-Tip: Let reps self-identify their learning goals: “What skills do you want to master next?” It shows you care about their growth while guiding your program’s design.

4. Equip Reps for Today’s Buyer Expectations

Today’s customers expect more: 94% say good service makes them more likely to buy again, and improving retention by just 5% can yield up to 95% more profits. Plus, only 1 in 26 unhappy customers complain, so unseen issues abound.

How can your salespeople keep customers happy? It’s easier than you think:

• Train reps in soft skills like empathy and active listening and create your own product training modules to improve product fluency and consultative selling.

• 40% of reps say they aren’t trained for virtual selling and the field is getting more complex by the day as AI tools provide more data and predictive analytics than ever to competing sales teams. Focus on digital readiness and AI competence to build your sales team’s tech confidence.

5. Help Reps Adapt & Thrive in Uncertainty

Sales has changed— 82% of reps have had to adapt to new ways of selling, and 86% of managers say adaptability is more important now than five years ago.

• Encourage risk-taking and experimentation in role-play—let reps try new approaches and learn from them. 

• Build a growth mindset culture: celebrate learning, not just results.

6. Turn Training into Strategy with Data & Insights

Top-performing teams use sales strategy training—not just product dumps—and they couple it with tracking and coaching.

• Integrate your LMS with CRM to spot skills gaps, assign content, and measure progress.

• Leverage gamification—leaderboards, badges, and certificates—to reinforce learning and build momentum, keeping sales teams motivated.

7. Keep It Ongoing—Don’t Let Training Be a One-and-Done

Reps forget sales training fast: 70% within a week, 87% within a month. Continual reinforcement is critical.

• Schedule periodic check-ins, microlearning modules, and peer learning sessions.

• Use enablement tools within your LMS—like AI playlists or mobile nudges—for scheduled follow-ups.

Your Next Moves

You now have a blueprint to make your sales training faster, smarter, and stickier—delivered with clarity, relevance, and energy.

Ready to see it in action? Explore your path forward:

• • Learn how to drive sales revenue with training best practices. Read the sales training guide here.
  • Get a free, no-obligation demo. Sign up for the demo here.